good food, good laughter, good love, good life!

I get a salad at a fast food restaurant that comes with an avocado lime dressing, and I thought, “Surely I can make this – and make it a bit healthier than this probably is….” being that there were many ingredients I couldn’t even pronounce, let alone know what they even were!

On that same day, I saw a lighter version chicken tostada posted on a social media site and thought, “It’s fate. This is what I’m supposed to make tonight.” No, not really. It just looked incredibly good and I thought they would go together perfectly!

Recipe is below, but I first take the avocados (RIPE) and the rest of the ingredients, and put them into the food processor. Puree all of it until you have a creamy salad dressing. You could alway eat it right away, but I like to let it chill in the refrigerator for a few hours to let all the flavors swim in the pool of yummy-ness together.

Tasted it, and thought I wanted it a little bit spicier, so I added more pepper.

If your dressing is too thick, add a tablespoon of water or milk at a time to thin it out.

You can either fry your tortilla, or you can bake them. I chose to fry them because I wanted the crunch. I cut a bigger tortilla in 1/2 and cooked them in oil for about 2 minutes a side. They bubble up and get brown. Remove, and place on a paper towel so you can drain the excess oil off. They are delicious!! Don’t eat them yet – you could, but wait.

You can barely see it here, but I also cooked a can of low sodium black beans. Put them in a pot for about 35 minutes on medium high heat with 1 can of water, 1/2 an onion thinly sliced, sprinkle of black pepper, and sprinkle of garlic salt. Let it cook down while stirring every 10 min or so until the beans cook down and they are almost all mush. You can spread a layer of beans on the tostada first. Again, follow the marinade and grilling recipe below to cook your chicken breasts. Once cooked and cooled a little, slice it, or shred it. Put as much chicken as you like on your tostada – (fried or oven baked – your choice) Top with a little bit of the avocado lime dressing.

I also like to top mine with lettuce, diced tomato, cheddar cheese, and sometimes finely diced red onion. SO yummy. Enjoy!!

Place all ingredients into food processor and process until smooth. Taste. Season according to your taste. If too acidic, add more milk or mayo. If not enough acid, add more lime juice or 1 tsp of vinegar.

Place chicken breasts in a container or a gallon size ziplock bag. Add all other items – it will be a marinade. Let the chicken marinade for at least an hour. Cook in a saucepan on medium high heat for about 4-5 min per side. Finish in a 350 degree oven for about 20 minutes more. Take out, let cool. Shred or slice.

There aren’t too many recipes I look forward to making each week. Bolognese, I have to say, is one I don’t mind taking the necessary steps to GREATNESS. Mouth watering, greatness. It is also one of my family’s most favorite recipes I cook each week. It’s definitely a labor of love because it involves steps and patience.

I first saw the recipe from Anne Burrell. This is the recipe I absolutely love. If you follow the process exactly how she says to – your bolognese will rival those served in small, quaint cafes in Italy. I do know this! We took a trip to Italy last summer and I tasted one that could be served side by side next to mine. (I have changed mine up just a bit to personal preference, so feel free to experiment with yours as well!)

First, you are going to take the carrots, celery, onion and garlic and put them in a food processor until it’s a pulp. You can add olive oil to the food processor if it makes it easier to process. Sauté the pulp mixture in olive oil with 2 Tsp of salt on med-high heat with a Tbps of olive oil for about 15 minutes, stirring every 3-4 minutes. It will start out really liquidy (like in the pic below) but then it will start to tighten up and resemble cornbread.

When it’s getting close to being done, it’s a nutty brown color, and it will look like cornbread a little. Maybe 2 mins more. Shove it aside in the pan to make room for your meat. Scrape with your wooden spoon.

Add your meat another 2 tsp salt and LET IT COOK. Do not skimp these processes. Let those flavors develop.

Once meat is browned all the way through, add your tomato paste. Notice, I still have my veggies to the side. You can also take them completely out if you want.

Let the tomato paste cook a bit through for approx 4-5 minutes stirring once or twice (It will be thick)

Add your red wine and let this cook out for approx 5-7 minutes stirring a few times.

Once red wine has reduced, add water – but do NOT add too much water. An inch above the meat is enough. If I’m making this batch, 1 1/2 cups of water is plenty. 2 is max. If you’re making Anne Burrell’s full recipe, I think 3 cups is max.

I add the seasonings next and stir. Lower your heat to low to medium (where you have a soft simmer) Now it’s just a game of cooking out/ add water / cooking out / add water game. Set your timer for 45 minutes the first go around. Taste. Remember: it WILL concentrate the more liquid you let cook out. I do this about 3 times total throughout the cooking. The whole thing takes me about 2 1/2 hours to make. You can rush it, but the flavors won’t be nearly developed enough. The end result is a thick, salty, rich, hearty flavored bolognese and is incredible over fettuccine or rice. Hubs and son aren’t fond of pasta, so they prefer it over rice. 🙂 Enjoy!

If you’re still a little scared to try, please watch a video, Anne Burrell has made a video showing how she makes hers. Now, she uses a shit-load of salt in hers. I don’t use that much. Again, make it to your own preference! Once I watched it, I felt much more confident that I could make it on my own! Click HERE to watch her video.

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Holiday Time.
Being around extended family for a longer-than-normal amount of time.
Black Friday.
Excess of food left out at any given moment.
The bad kinds of food left out at any given moment.
Last minute work projects before holiday time.

Any and all of these things can spike up blood pressure. “It’s the Most Wonderful Time…..” -maybe. Sometimes.

Blood pressure is a sensitive subject in my household. My dear hubby of 19 years suffers from high blood pressure. A lot of debate exists when talking about whether genetics play a bigger role or if lifestyle and how you handle stress play a bigger role. Some recent findings say lifestyle plays a bigger role. I wanted to study up and see if there was anything I could do to help lower his blood pressure, but also get our family on a healthier path. Exercise was one area. We started walking 3 times a week together. What we put into our bodies was another.

Enter sodium. Dun-dun-dun-dun….

Americans get 75% of their sodium intake in processed foods. Sodium (when the amount is appropriate) plays a vital role in our health. Improved heart performance, needed for blood regulation, and glucose absorption. It is an important factor in the human diet for the regulation of cellular activity and nervous system function. You probably know what I’m going to say next. That McDonalds fries are some of the best fries on the planet?? You’ve got a gift. Sometimes you do just have to hit the drive through for the fries. Getting a small fry every 2 weeks is a treat. And a necessity. Ok, not a necessity, but there are some things you just have to enjoy.

Well, the other thing I was going to say is that with the good comes the bad. Too much sodium can lead to stomach cancer, hypertension (high blood pressure), and can even lead to coma. So, how much should one take in? All blogs tend to agree that you should take no more than

2,300mg

of sodium a day and even LESSthan that if you’re over 50. Think this is a fair amount and you shouldn’t have any troubles? Think again. The table below shows a typical day for anyone – especially a busy, working mom who tends to pick up food on the go. I have been easily guilty of this. Throw in a few medium cokes, and a grande Starbucks Latte in there…no wonder I gained 20 lbs in 2 years!

How can you control this? Will my food still be good? Is there hope!? YES, YES, and YES
*By eating less processed foods and preparing meals ahead of time – think FRESH
*By not picking up items like frozen cheese pizzas (that have over 800mg of sodium a serving)
*By eating fresh foods like more fruits and veggies
*By purchasing items that say “Reduced Sodium” or “No Sodium”
*By reducing your salt each recipe by 1/4 tsp, or not adding even more salt when you get a meal from a restaurant. Your taste buds will get used to this and your heart will thank you for it!

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First, you will love Quinoa. You will. You will. I will you to love Quinoa. I think most either haven’t tried it, or they’ve tried it plain.

Second, did you know that 1 cup of ground chicken is just over 300 calories. JUST over 300 calories, and less than 18g of fat!

I’ve been trying different recipes where I can throw in a little Quinoa to get my family used to it. Quinoa is high in protein, lacks gluten, is a great source of fiber and very easy to digest! It is slowly gaining popularity in the US. It also is supposed to make you fuller-for longer. You can find many different kinds of Quinoa. You can find blends of wild rice, bulgar, and quinoa. You can use that in this recipe, as well! This is the one I chose to use:

One meal I LOVE is cabbage rolls. If you don’t love cabbage rolls, I’m sure you can find a great substitute for this instead of cabbage leaves. My goal was to make cabbage rolls with ground chicken and quinoa-but still have great flavor that regular beef or pork filled cabbage rolls provide.

Recipe will be below. First, follow the recipe on how to prepare the Quinoa in a separate, small pan. You will only need about 1/4-1/2 cup of Quinoa cooked, so 1/2 a cup of Quinoa is plenty. While this is cooking:

Pre-heat oven to 375. I sauteed 1/4 cup onion, 1/4 cup of green or red bell pepper (any color is fine, really), and 3 cloves of chopped garlic with 2 Tbsp of olive oil until almost soft. (about 4 min) I added my ground chicken and spices. Cook until chicken is almost done.

Next, I add about 20 leaves of spinach, and the chili pepper paste (provides a tiny bit of sweet but also the HEAT), and 1/4 of chopped tomatoes (I use the Poma brand in a box). Save the rest of the chopped tomatoes to pour on top of the cabbage rolls once you assemble them. You can honestly add anything to this dish that you think you may like. All of the flavors blend nicely.

Let the mixture cook for about 10 minutes. The flavors will marry and come together nicely! Taste. If you think it’s pretty bland, add more seasoning or pepper. The Quinoa should be done. Add about 1/4 cup of Quinoa to the mixture. Combine well.

Next, assemble the cabbage rolls.

Roll them up and place them in a casserole dish. Don’t worry about them being perfect leaves. You’ll spoon each leaf bundle out with a big spoon and just dig in with your fork.

Take remaining ground chicken mixture and add 1/4 cup of the chopped tomatoes to the pan. Pour some of the mixture on each roll -but not covering completely. (Pic below) Put a layer of foil on casserole dish and cover tightly. Cook for 25 minutes. Be careful when you remove, as the steam will be quite hot.

Choose smaller plates. I do remember seeing a special on 20/20 or Dateline or another news show where they conducted a buffet type study. In it, people were given a certain color plate. For whatever reason, people with white plates tended to eat more food. Again – can’t recall the exact show. I may even have the color wrong. Point being…. there’s some Tom Foolery going on with our minds at all times. It’s no different when it comes to food.

In the pic below, you can see clearly how big (or small) the piece of bread looks on each plate. Obviously- feels like you’re eating more with the smaller plate. (Bigger one is your standard, dinner size plate. Smaller one is more of a salad plate or side plate.) We also tend to try to fill up the empty real estate on bigger plates. Unless you’re one of those really disciplined people who purposely tries to just put food in the center of the plate….to which I ask…why not just buy smaller plates then?? Ah well. To each…

In our little family, we have replaced a lot of our bigger plates with these small plates in effort to maintain a healthy and active lifestyle. I may post a future blog on proper portion sizes, because I think this has gone on the crazy train as of late. I don’t think people really understand what size they just ate – particularly at restaurants. Anyway, smaller plates. That’s my first tip.

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I have come across a blog through Instagram – Bleubird – that I absolutely love. I think she home schools, and her husband is a photographer. It is evident in both of their Instagram accounts. I could spend hours
looking at all of the photos!

The most recent one I came across was a recipe for Brussels Sprouts. Now, before you turn your nose up at Brussels Sprouts, just know that they contain a chemical (sulforaphane) -known to have anticancer properties. It also is a source of indole-3-carbinol ~another chemical which boasts DNA repair and appears to block growth of cancer cells – so there! It is a member of the cabbage family, so if you’ve never had it before, think of it as cabbage and broccoli having a baby?? Maybe?

Anyway, she recently was able to have a meal at Uchi in Houston, where she said it was one of her all time favorites. She tried to re-create the recipe by flipping through similar recipes until she came up with this one. I could not find “Sweet Chili” but I did find other websites that said you could make your own. After toying around with different variations, this is my homage to Bleubird! 🙂

I will call them:

UchiBird Inspired Brussels

Cut them in 1/2 and coat them with olive oil, salt and pepper. Put them in a roasting pan and roast at 400 for about 10-15 min. (If you use frozen, they will more than likely turn to mush – so I recommend using fresh Brussels in the produce section) While they were roasting, I mixed together:

I mixed together: 1/2 tsp fish sauce, 2 tsp chili paste, and 4 TBSP of La Choy’s sweet and sour sauce. I have seen other variations where people use rice wine vinegar in theirs. Mix it together and see what you need. If it’s way too hot, add more sweet and sour. Beware! The chili paste is very hot, but it gives the brussels a kick! (I found this sauce is also delicious with chicken or shrimp!!! If you’re cooking with shrimp, I would marinate them in it and grill for 3-4 minutes per side.)

After the brussels cook for 10-15 min, take them out and coat them with the mixture. Let them broil for another 5 or so minutes. If dark browning occurs – this is OK. This is the yum yum zone. They will caramelize a little – again, this is OK. They should also be fork tender by now.

We had ours with sirloin steaks and sweet mashed potatoes with a dab of butter, and cinnamon. Delish!!